From 3f68499ec4768e2ae1bfe2e390ba66a90b190fc0 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Christopher Vogt <oss.nsp@cvogt.org>
Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2017 17:01:30 -0500
Subject: Document CBT plugin style guide and adjust Scalafmt plugin
 accordingly

---
 doc/plugin-author-guide.md | 105 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 105 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 doc/plugin-author-guide.md

(limited to 'doc')

diff --git a/doc/plugin-author-guide.md b/doc/plugin-author-guide.md
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+## How to write an idiomatic CBT plugin?
+
+Write a small library that could be fully used outside of CBT's
+build classes and handles all the use cases you need. For example
+
+```
+object MyLibrary{
+ def doSomething( ... ) = // do something here
+}
+```
+
+Publish it as a library and you might be done right here.
+
+If your library requires configuration information commonly found
+in your build, like the sourceFiles, groupId, scalaVersion or else,
+consider offering a mixin trait, that pre-configures your library
+for user convenience. (Consider publishing them separately if that
+allows people to use your library outside of CBT with fewer
+dependencies.) Here is an example of a library with an
+accompanying mixin trait configuring the library for CBT.
+
+```
+package my.library
+object MyLibrary{
+  case class DoSomething( scalaVersion: String, ... ){
+    case class config( targetFile: File, affectBehavior: Boolean = true, ... ){
+      def apply = // really do something here
+    }
+  }
+}
+
+package my.plugin
+trait MyLibrary extends BaseBuild{
+  def doSomething = MyLibrary.DoSomething(scalaVersion, ...).config( scalaTarget / "my.file" )
+}
+```
+
+* Note: Do not override any common method like `compile` or `test` in a public plugin. *
+* Instead document recommendations where users should hook in your custom methods. *
+* This will help users understand their own builds. *
+
+See how we only define a single `def doSomething` in the MyLibrary
+trait? We did not define things like `def doSomethingTargetFile`.
+Instead we have a case class defined in the library which a user
+can .copy as needed to customize configuration. A user build could
+look like this:
+
+```
+class Build(val context: Context) extends MyLibrary{
+  override def doSomething = super.doSomething.copy(
+    affectBehavior = false
+  )
+}
+```
+
+As you can see a user can use .copy to override default behavior
+of your library.
+
+This nesting allows us to keep the global namespace small, which
+helps us lower the risk of global name clashes between different
+libraries. It also makes it clearer that `affectBehavior` is
+something specific to `MyLibary` which should help making builds
+easier to understand. Further this nesting means we don't need to
+encode namespaces in the names themselves, but use Scala's language
+features for that, which allows us to keep names nice and concise.
+
+You might wonder why there is a case class `DoSomething` rather
+than `scalaVersion` just being another parameter in case class
+`config`. Nesting case classes like this is a pattern that given
+the way we use them allows us to make it slightly harder to
+modify some parameters (the ones on the outer case class) than
+others (the ones on the inner case class). Why? Some are likely
+to need user customization, others are likely to break stuff if
+they are touched. Example: The scalaVersion is probably something
+you want to configure once consistently across your entire build.
+Otherwise you might end up accidentally packaging scala-2.11
+compiled class files as a jar with a `_2.10` artifact id.
+Changing which targetFile `doSomething` writes to however is
+something you should be able to safely change. Since we defined
+`doSomething` as
+`def doSomething = MyLibrary.DoSomething(...).config( ... )`
+overriding behavior in user code with .copy only affects
+the inner case class because super.doSomething is an instance
+of that:
+```
+  override def doSomething = super.doSomething.copy(
+    affectBehavior = false
+  )
+```
+Overriding things in class `DoSomething` is possible by creating
+an entire new instance of the outer one, but slightly harder
+preventing users from accidentally doing the wrong thing.
+
+Obviously this decisions what's dangerous to override and what
+is not can be a judgment call and not 100% clear.
+
+A few more conventions for more uniform plugin designs:
+If you only have one outer case class in yur plugin `object`,
+call the case class `apply` instead of `DoSomething`. If you
+need multiple (because you basically have several commands,
+each with their own private configuration), give it a name
+representing the operation, e.g. `compile` or `doc`. If there
+is only one inner case class inside of anothe case class,
+call it `config`, give it a name representing the operation,
+e.g. `compile` or `doc`.
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